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vineri, 1 martie 2013

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UX Myths That Hurt SEO - Whiteboard Friday

Posted: 28 Feb 2013 05:14 PM PST

Posted by randfish

User experience and SEO: friends or enemies? They've had a rocky past, but it's time we all realized that they live better in harmony. Dispelling the negative myths about how UX and SEO interact is the first step in improving both the look and search results of your website.

In today's Whiteboard Friday, Rand talks about some persistent UX myths that we should probably ignore.

Have anything to add that we didn't cover? Leave your thoughts in the comments below!

Video Transcription

"Howdy, SEOmoz fans, and welcome to another edition of Whiteboard Friday. This week I wanted to talk a little about user experience, UX, and the impact that it has on SEO.

Now, the problem historically has been that these two worlds have had a lot of conflict, especially like late '90s, early 2000s, and that conflict has stayed a little bit longer than I think it should have. I believe the two are much more combined today. But there are a few things that many people, including those who invest in user experience, believe to be true about how people use the web and the problems that certain user experience, types of functionality, certain design types of things cause impact SEO, and they impact SEO negatively. So I want to dispel some of those myths and give you things that you can focus on and fix in your own websites and in your projects so that you can help not only your SEO, but also your UX.

So let's start with number one here. Which of these is better or worse? Let's say you've got a bunch of form fields that you need a user to fill out to complete some sort of a registration step. Maybe they need to register for a website. Maybe they're checking out of an e-commerce cart. Maybe they're signing up for an event. Maybe they're downloading something.

Whatever it is, is this better, putting all of the requests on one page so that they don't have to click through many steps? Or is it better to break them up into multiple steps? What research has generally shown and user experience testing has often shown is that a lot of the time, not all of the time certainly, but a lot of the time this multi-step process, perhaps unintuitively, is the better choice.

You can see this in a lot of e-commerce carts that do things very well. Having a single, simple, direct, one step thing that, oh yes, of course I can fill out my email address and give you a password. Then, oh yeah, sure I can enter my three preferences. Then, yes, I'll put in my credit card number. Those three things actually are more likely to carry users through a process because they're so simple and easy to do, rather than putting it all together on one page.

I think the psychology behind this is that this just feels very overwhelming, very daunting. It makes us sort of frustrated, like, "Oh, do I really have to go through that?"

I'm not saying you should immediately switch to one of these, but I would fight against this whole, "Oh, we're not capturing as many registrations. Our conversion rate is lower. Our SEO leads aren't coming in as well, because we have a multi-step process, and it should be single step." The real key is to usability test to get data and metrics on what works better and to choose the right path. Probably if you have something small, splitting it up into a bunch of steps doesn't matter as much. If you have something longer, this might actually get more users through your funnel.

Number two. Is it true that if we give people lots of choice, then they'll choose the best path for them, versus if we only give people a couple options that they might not go and take the action that they would have, had we given them those greater choices? One of my favorite examples from this, from the inbound marketing world, the SEO world, the sharing world, the social world is with social sharing buttons themselves. You'll see tons of websites, blogs, content sites, where they offer just an overwhelming quantity of tweet this, share this on Facebook, like this on Facebook, like us on Facebook, like our company page on Facebook, plus one this on Google+, follow us on Google+, embed this on your own webpage, link to this page, Pinterest this.

Okay. Yes, those are all social networks. Some of them may be indeed popular with many of your users. The question is: Are you overwhelming them and creating what psychologists have often called the "paradox of choice," which is that we as human beings, when we look at a long list of items and have to make a decision, we're often worse at making that decision than we would be if we looked at a smaller list of options? This is true whether it's a restaurant menu or shopping for shoes or crafting something on the Internet. Etsy has this problem constantly with an overwhelming mass of choice and people spending lots of time on the site, but then not choosing to buy something because of that paradox of choice.

What I would urge you to do is not necessarily to completely get rid of this, but maybe to alter your philosophy slightly to the three or four or if you want to be a little religious about it, even the one social network or item that you think is going to have the very most impact. You can test this and bear it out across the data of your users and say, "Hey, you know what? 80% of our users are on Facebook. That's the network where most of the people take the action even when we offer them this choice. Let's see if by slimming it down to just one option, Twitter or Facebook or just the two, we can get a lot more engagement and actions going." This is often the case. I've seen it many, many times.

Number three. Is it true that it's absolutely terrible to have a page like this that is kind of text only? It's just text and spacing, maybe some bullet points, and there are no images, no graphics, no visual elements. Or should we bias to, hey let's have a crappy stock photo of some guy holding up a box or of a team smiling with each other?

In my experience, and a lot of the tests that I've seen around UX and visual design stuff, this is actually a worse idea than just going with a basic text layout. If for some reason you can't break up your blog post, your piece of content, and you just don't have the right visuals for it, I'd urge you to break it up by having different sections, by having good typography and good visual design around your text, and I'd urge you to use headlines and sub-headlines. I wouldn't necessarily urge you to go out and find crappy stock photos, or if you're no good at creating graphics, to go and make a no good graphic. This bias has created a lot of content on the web that in my opinion is less credible, and I think some other folks have experienced that through testing. We've seen it a little bit with SEOmoz itself too.

Number four. Is it true that people never scroll, that all the content that you want anyone to see must be above the fold on a standard web page, no matter what device you think someone might be looking at it on? Is that absolutely critical?

The research reveals this is actually a complete myth. Research tells us that people do scroll, that over the past decade, people have been trained to scroll and scroll very frequently. So content that is below the fold can be equally accessible. For you SEO folks and you folks who are working on conversion rate optimization and lead tracking, all that kind of stuff, lead optimization, funnel optimization, this can be a huge relief because you can put fewer items with more space up at the top, create a better visual layout, and draw the eye down. You don't have to go ahead and throw all of the content and all of the elements that you need and sacrifice some of the items that you wanted to put on the page. You can just allow for that scroll. Visual design here is obviously still critically important, but don't get boxed into this myth that the only thing people see is the above the fold stuff.

Last one. This myth is one of the ones that hurts SEOs the most, and I see lots of times, especially when consultants and agencies, or designers, developers are fighting with people on an SEO team, on a marketing team about, "Hey, we are aiming for great UX, not great SEO." I strongly disagree with this premise. This is a false dichotomy. These two, in fact, I think are so tied and interrelated that you cannot separate them. The findability, the discover bility, the ability for a page to perform well in search engines, which remains the primary way that we find new information on the Internet, that is absolutely as critically important as it is to have that great user experience on the website itself and through the website's pages.

If you're not tying these two together, or if you're like this guy and you think this is a fight or a competition, you are almost certainly doing one of these two wrong. Oftentimes it's SEO, right? People believe, hey we have to put this keyword in here this many times, and the page title has to be this big on the page. Or, oh we can't have this graphic here. It has to be this type of graphic, and it has to have these words on it.

Usually that stuff is not nearly important as it was, say, a decade ago. You can have fantastic UX and fantastic SEO working together. In fact, there almost always married.

If you're coming up with problems like these, please leave them in the comments. Reach out to me, tweet to me and let me know. I guarantee you almost all of them have a creative solution where the two can be brought together.

All right, gang, love to hear from you, and we will see you again next week for another edition of Whiteboard Friday. Take care."

Video transcription by Speechpad.com

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joi, 28 februarie 2013

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

"The Blame Game"
Media Hype Over Sequester Cuts
Did Obama Tax the US Into Recession?
Walmart Slow to Stock Shelves as Consumer Sales Slump

"The Blame Game"

Posted: 28 Feb 2013 10:13 PM PST

Finger-pointing and fear-mongering over trivial budget non-cuts are now in full swing. Obama is blaming House speaker John Boehner and of course Boehner is blaming Obama.

Of the more ridiculous hype, Obama asserts "Navy ships could lie idle and children would lose out on vaccinations if the cuts are not halted."

Mercy!

Mainstream Media Nonsense

New York Times: Austerity Kills Government Jobs as Cuts to Budgets Loom
Washington Post: Sequester will sock a vulnerable economy

Cooler Heads vs. Mainstream Media

Cooler heads prevail in non-mainstream media reports such as that of friend Tim Wallace as noted in Media Hype Over Sequester Cuts

Cooler heads also prevail in a NBC/WSJ Poll that shows "A majority of Americans (53%) prefer that Congress move ahead with the current sequester cuts or a plan that contains even more cuts, suggesting the public's general appetite for reducing spending."

Blame Game Campaign

Getting the media all hyped up over trivial "non-cuts" is all part of Obama's "Blame Game" Campaign. To be fair, Republicans have countered with their own campaign.

With those thoughts, I have a musical tribute to offer.

Musical Tribute to Shirley Ellis

Come on everybody!
I say now let's play a game
I betcha I can make a rhyme out of anybody's name

Obama!

Obama, Obama, bo Ama, Bonana fanna fo Fobama
Fee fy mo Mobama, Obama!

Everybody do Boehner
Boehner, Boehner, bo Oenner, Bonana fanna fo Foehner
Fee fy mo Moehner, Boehner!

Link if above video does not play: Shirley Ellis "The Name Game" (Merv Griffin Show 1965)

Let's do Chuck

I will let readers work out the "Name Game" rhyme to Chuck (or Buck) on their own accord. Suffice to say that a couple words appear that represent the true state of the economy.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

"Wine Country" Economic Conference Hosted By Mish
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Media Hype Over Sequester Cuts

Posted: 28 Feb 2013 03:59 PM PST

President Obama is playing the media like a fiddle (more accurately like the fools they are). Countless mainstream media articles talk about the devastation that is sure to follow if the sequester cuts take place. Obama has even hyped this up with threats of cuts on vaccinations for children.

Here is one example of the hype: New crisis looms as budget cuts hit US on Friday.

Billions of dollars in harsh budget cuts are hitting the U.S. government on Friday, and officials are conceding that last-minute moves by both Democrats and Republicans in Congress to soften the blow are doomed.

Economists and lawmakers alike agree that the cuts, the potential shutdown and the country's series of fiscal crises overall are hurting the country's shaky comeback from the Great Recession, and the effects will be felt around the world. Both political parties have said the cuts — of 5 percent to domestic agencies and 8 percent to the military— could inflict major damage to government programs and the economy at large.

Obama, speaking to a group of business executives Wednesday night, said the cuts would be a "tumble downward" for the economy, though he acknowledged it could takes weeks before many Americans feel the full impact of the budget shrinking.

Domestic agencies would see their budgets frozen almost exactly as they are, which would mean no money for new initiatives such as cybersecurity or for routine increases for programs such as low-income housing.

"We're not going to do that," said Sen. Tom Harkin, a Democrat.

Budget Freeze Oh My!

My friend Tim Wallace pinged me today with a few thoughts. ...

Hi Mish

In 2006 the Federal spending was $2.6 trillion. In 2008 the budget had gone up to $2.9 trillion, an increase of "only" 12.2% in two years. Then, the "financial crisis" hit and a "one time" increase in the budget was put in place to bail out all the political cronies.

That "one time" increase ballooned the budget to $3.5 trillion, an increase of 18% over 2008, but an increase of 32.6% over 2006!

So, what happened to this "one time" increase? Did it go away the next year? Of course not!

Federal spending has remained above $3.5 trillion since, and is even up again to about $3.6 trillion. This is 33% more than 6 years ago.

Suppose inflation was the basis for budget increases. Then let's use the joke of a 2% a year inflation rate that Bernanke claims. On that basis, spending based on 2000's numbers would be $2.3 trillion! If you double the rate of inflation to 4% a year since 2000, spending would be $2.9 trillion ($600 billion less - each year than the current budget).

Clearly the problem is spending yet allegedly mere decrease of $85 billion (most of it back-loaded) is too much for Obama and Bernanke.

Tim

This media hype over sequestration is ridiculous.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Did Obama Tax the US Into Recession?

Posted: 28 Feb 2013 11:31 AM PST

Here's the question of the day: Did president Obama tax the US into recession?

Trim Tab's Charles Biderman makes that exact claim in U.S. Entered Recession in January Yet Fed Fix Keeps Stocks Pumped.

Welcome to the new recession. TrimTabs tracking of real-time wages and salaries shows that the United States has entered into a recession this year. I had been predicting a slowdown after the big bump in December incomes due to the hike in taxes. It has taken a while for us to get a handle on income this year given all the changes in tax rates. But now enough time has passed that I can say I was right. The U.S. economy has slowed enough to enter into recession.

This is how I know we have entered into a recession. After-tax wages and salaries net of inflation have been shrinking year over year since the second week in January. What has been growing dramatically in real time this year is income and employment tax payments. Withheld income and employment taxes have been running about 8.3% higher year over year, comparing the same 33 business days between Tuesday, January 8 and Monday, February 25.

Checking with our favorite official Washington economist, we now know that higher employment taxes accounted for 6% and new soak-the-rich taxes 2% of that 8.3% gain. That means that, before inflation, after-tax wages and salaries grew by only 0.3% for the 135 million Americans that have jobs subject to withholding.

After inflation? Well, what is inflation now? If you believe the Fed, around 2%. Others say higher. Regardless, there is no doubt that the Obama Administration has taxed us into a recession. Congratulations.

Inquiring minds may wish to read the rest of Biderman's article for some interesting thoughts on insider selling, stock buybacks, and Trim Tabs' employment projections vs. BLS reporting.

When Did the Recession Start?

Biderman claims the recession started in 2013. I suggest the US has been in recession since last June or July but the recession was masked over by four identifiable factors.

Obamacare was responsible for huge hiring of part-timers in the third and fourth quarter, distorting unemployment statistics.
Tax policy and Obamacare policy further shifted expenses and salaries into 4th quarter, yet nominal GDP was still negative for the quarter.
Electioneering games, particularly in regards to military spending, distorted the third quarter statistics.
Blatantly dishonest GDP deflators have overstated Real GDP for all of 2012 but especially the second half of the year.

Let's assume I am wrong about recession timing, and Biderman is correct. The initial question remains.

Is Obama to Blame?

The answer is no, not really. If the US was not in recession before and is now, the tipping factor is likely to be 2% payroll tax hikes that started in January and secondarily state tax hikes such as Proposition 30 Tax hikes in California, not specifically Obama's tax-the-wealthy policies.

Certainly Governor Brown and union fearmongering is responsible for the hikes in California.

Who is to blame for the payroll tax hikes? I suggest both parties. There never should have been a cut in the first place with these preposterous budget deficits.

It's not that I am against tax cuts. Rather I am against preposterous budget deficits and both parties are certainly to blame for that.

This does not detract from Biderman's overall analysis, just the finger-pointing about who is to blame.

Ultimately, Fed policies, fractional reserve lending, and Congressional spending are the real culprits in this mess, and I bet if Biderman gave it a second thought, that he would agree (regardless of which of us is correct on timing).

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Walmart Slow to Stock Shelves as Consumer Sales Slump

Posted: 28 Feb 2013 09:58 AM PST

Looking for strong evidence a consumer slowdown is in progress? Look no further than a Bloomberg reports that shows Wal-Mart's Slowness to Stock Shelves Worsens, Sales Slump.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc (WMT), already struggling to woo shoppers constrained by higher taxes, is "getting worse" at keeping shelves stocked, the retailer's U.S. chief told executives, according to minutes of an officers' meeting obtained by Bloomberg News.

"We run out quickly and the new stuff doesn't come in," U.S. Chief Executive Officer Bill Simon said, according to the minutes of the Feb. 1 meeting. Simon called "self-inflicted wounds" Wal-Mart's "biggest risk" and said an executive vice president had been appointed to fix the restocking problem, according to the minutes.

Once a paragon of logistics, the world's largest retailer has been trying to improve its restocking efforts since at least 2011, hiring consultants to walk the aisles and track whether hundreds of items are available. It even reassigned store greeters to replenish merchandise. The restocking challenge emerged as Wal-Mart was returning more merchandise to shelves and reducing staff in many stores.

Wal-Mart's inability to keep its shelves stocked coincides with slowing sales growth. Same-store sales in the U.S. for the 13 weeks ending April 26 will be little changed, Simon said in the company's Feb. 21 earnings call.

There's Something Happening Here

In case you missed it, please consider Walmart Senior VP Asks "Where are All the Customers? And Where's Their Money?"; "February MTD Sales a Total Disaster"

With a tribute to Buffalo Springfield (sorry I cannot find a decent musical video) ...
There's something happening here. What it is, is exactly clear ...

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

vineri, 1 martie 2013

Your Pinterest Weekly Email: 6 Recommended Boards

Hi, Hari!

Here at Pinterest...

Popular Boards

Water Wheels / Water Mills ...

Outside Gardening Tips

Nail Art

Products I Love

Stained Glass and Mosaic ...

I Love reading

Pins You'll Love

UX Myths That Hurt SEO - Whiteboard Friday

UX Myths That Hurt SEO - Whiteboard Friday

Video Transcription

Seth's Blog : You already have permission

You already have permission

More Recent Articles

joi, 28 februarie 2013

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Pagini

Persoane interesate

Arhivă blog

vineri, 1 martie 2013

Your Pinterest Weekly Email: 6 Recommended Boards

Hi, Hari!

Here at Pinterest...

Popular Boards

Water Wheels / Water Mills ...

Outside Gardening Tips

Nail Art

Products I Love

Stained Glass and Mosaic ...

I Love reading

Pins You'll Love

UX Myths That Hurt SEO - Whiteboard Friday

UX Myths That Hurt SEO - Whiteboard Friday

Video Transcription

Seth's Blog : You already have permission

You already have permission

More Recent Articles

joi, 28 februarie 2013

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Pagini

Persoane interesate

Arhivă blog

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